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The nuclear star cluster of our own Milky Way Galaxy seen with adaptive optics in the infrared with the NaCo instrument on the VLT.. A nuclear star cluster (NSC) or compact stellar nucleus (sometimes called young stellar nucleus) is a star cluster with high density and high luminosity near the center of mass of most galaxies.
[2] [3] Cluster member stars show a near-solar metallicity, meaning the abundance of elements with atomic numbers higher than 2 are similar to those in the Sun. [8] The cluster shows evidence of tidal tails, which are most likely of galactic origin. [10] The cluster field displays evidence of a much larger, background star stream.
There is often ongoing star formation in these clusters, so embedded clusters may be home to various types of young stellar objects including protostars and pre-main-sequence stars. An example of an embedded cluster is the Trapezium Cluster in the Orion Nebula .
Messier 34 (also known as M34, NGC 1039, or the Spiral Cluster) is a large and relatively near open cluster in Perseus. It was probably discovered by Giovanni Batista Hodierna before 1654 [ 4 ] and included by Charles Messier in his catalog of comet -like objects in 1764.
The first known globular cluster, now called M 22, was discovered in 1665 by Abraham Ihle, a German amateur astronomer. [4] [5] [6] The cluster Omega Centauri, easily visible in the southern sky with the naked eye, was known to ancient astronomers like Ptolemy as a star, but was reclassified as a nebula by Edmond Halley in 1677, [7] then finally as a globular cluster in the early 19th century ...
In physics, the term clusters denotes small, polyatomic particles. As a rule of thumb, any particle made of between 3×10 0 and 3×10 7 atoms is considered a cluster.. The term can also refer to the organization of protons and neutrons within an atomic nucleus, e.g. the alpha particle (also known as "α-cluster" [1]), consisting of two protons and two neutrons (as in a helium nucleus).
Star formation theory, as well as accounting for the formation of a single star, must also account for the statistics of binary stars and the initial mass function. Most stars do not form in isolation but as part of a group of stars referred as star clusters or stellar associations. [2]
Many globular clusters, such as the 13-Gyr old cluster M30 (pictured), are mass segregated. In astronomy, dynamical mass segregation is the process by which heavier members of a gravitationally bound system, such as a star cluster, tend to move toward the center, while lighter members tend to move farther away from the center.